Chapter 78

Seth and Elise departed the audience chamber, the silver doors whispering shut behind them.

Silence settled in their wake. The queen rose and turned her gaze to the Lord Marshal.

“What is your measure of Seth Grimm?” she asked.

Sir Jenson Dunfield did not answer at once. His brow furrowed beneath streaked dark hair, jaw tightening as he weighed his words.

“He is dangerous, Your Majesty.” He clasped his hands behind his back. “He is not the peaceful family man he presents himself to be. He is an independent warlord who has already destabilized the north. Northwatch Keep - by all reports - is restored and defensible. He commands at least one dragon. A void-mage stands at his side. He wields powerful magic himself. And we know little of the others who follow him.”

He shifted his weight slightly. “He shelters an orc so reviled that the Iron Nation has rallied its hordes and now threatens to march through our lands to reach her. That alone could spark war.”

His blue eyes flicked briefly toward the doors Seth had exited through. “He addressed you as an equal, not as sovereign of a greater realm. He stands confidently in the shadow of our armies. That confidence troubles me. Somehow, he believes himself capable of surviving us.”

A pause. “And yet… he does not strike me as a fool.”

Dunfield exhaled slowly. “I do not believe he is an immediate threat, Your Majesty. But he will not bend to intimidation. And if provoked, he will escalate - swiftly and decisively.”

The queen inclined her head once, then turned to the archmagus.

“And you, Garrethyn?”

Archmagus Garrethyn Amberleigh worried at the inside of his cheek before answering, his clouded eye unfocused as his mind turned inward. “I find myself in agreement with Jenson,” he said at last. “The boy is dangerous.”

He leaned more heavily upon his ivory staff. “He is not politically driven. He has little interest in titles, glory, or recognition. His loyalty lies with those he calls family. That is both his strength and his vulnerability.”

Amberleigh’s green eye sharpened. “By his own account - corroborated by our scouts and Apprentice Rosecroft - he entered the Interstitium and returned without corruption. That should not be possible.”

His fingers tightened on the staff. “I sensed no trace of Myrddin infection within him. But I must admit, Your Majesty, that my experience with such corruption is limited. It has been over a millennium since the last confirmed manifestation. I cannot say with certainty how it might present.”

He hesitated. “His mana is strong. Unusually so. But that is not all. There is… something else about him. A resonance beneath the surface. It may be this Rite of Shared Flame. It may be something else. I cannot say.”

Amberleigh’s voice softened. “What troubles me most is this - he does not fully understand himself. A man ignorant of his own limits can be as dangerous as one who is underestimated.”

The queen stood in thoughtful silence for several heartbeats, her fingers resting lightly on the golden arm of her throne. “How would you proceed, Jenson?”

“Restore trade,” Dunfield replied without hesitation. “Send scouts. Quietly assess his defenses. His alliances. His capabilities. If possible, place eyes within his household. We need intelligence.”

The queen turned again. “Garrethyn?”

The old wizard hesitated, then nodded slowly. “I agree. Our greatest weakness is ignorance.”

He drew a careful breath. “I would also send a wizard - one capable of detecting corruption should it exist. I believe Seth Grimm is either uniquely blessed… or uniquely altered.”

Silence lingered in the chamber.

Outside, beyond the palace walls, the city of Crownreach glittered beneath the fading sun.

* * *

“Did you find Elyndra? It is not like her to dally when given a task.”

The Concordance chamber was full, every throne occupied save two - Lunythera’s crescent of polished silver and Elyndra’s pale wooden seat carved into a flock of birds forever frozen mid-flight. Their absence hung heavier than any presence.

“No, my lord,” Miralis replied, bronze skin catching the drifting light of ambient Faith. “But I bring troubling news. Her library has sunk beneath the sea.”

Aurelion rose from his jewel-encrusted throne in a slow, deliberate motion. Behind him, raw Faith shimmered and coiled like a living aurora - veins of red and green writhing through the air. “And her demesne?” he demanded.

“Empty,” Miralis said. “Yet her Faith endures - she lives.” She stepped forward and extended a waterlogged scrap of parchment. “I found this in the wreckage of her material lair.”

He took it. As his molten-gold eyes moved across the ink, lightning began to crackle over his skin.

“What troubles you, my lord?” asked a woman of luminous crystal.

Her faceted body shimmered with inner light, translucent planes catching and refracting the auroral glow. Within her chest, a red-gold radiance pulsed like a banked hearth, each flare sending molten reflections through her glasslike ribs. Sparks and embers swirled through her hair in restless currents, occasionally gathering into fox-shaped flickers before dissolving again.

Flame clothed her in an ever-shifting gown, its molten hues cascading to her ankles while her bare arms glowed faintly, heat warping the air around them. She reclined upon a throne of pale blue fire, its cool flames steady and silent beneath her.

“Seth,” Aurelion said, voice edged with thunder. “He seeks to overthrow us.”

“You are certain?” rumbled a mountain of a woman.

Her body was hewn from rough granite veined with iron and copper. Crystals grew from her skin like natural regalia - amethyst and quartz forming bracelets at her wrists, a jagged collar glittering at her throat. She was vast - towering over twelve feet tall, and immovable - her strength evident in every carved plane of stone. Lichen-green hair clung short against her scalp, and her emerald eyes shone with hard, deliberate clarity.

She sat upon a mound of raw stone, its hollowed center cradling her like a caldera formed by ancient ****. The seat was not crafted but shaped - part of the floating island itself, risen up to support her weight. Around her, the stone seemed thicker, denser, as if bowing in her presence.

Aurelion flicked the parchment toward her. She caught it with startling grace and scanned it briefly.

“Why would he leave such a note?” she asked. “Clearly we were meant to find this.”

“He is taunting us,” Aurelion replied. “He stood in our presence and disrespected us - disrespected me. He boasted we had no power over him. He threatened to turn against us.”

“You provoked him,” countered Urzan-Brak, his voice a grinding avalanche. The beast of slag and iron shifted upon his throne of shattered armor and broken blades. His eyes smoldered like banked coals.

“I did no such thing!” Aurelion roared. Marble flesh veined with silver strained beneath his white tunic and wine-dark toga as he clenched his fists.

“What is it you propose?” asked a man with skin the deep blue of open water.

His white hair never stilled, churning and curling about his head like seafoam rolling against a restless shore. It moved with no wind to drive it - eddying, folding back upon itself, forever in motion. He was lean rather than broad, built like a swimmer carved by tides and distance - long-limbed, powerful without heaviness.

Bracers of translucent jade clasped his forearms, polished smooth as riverstone yet faintly luminous from within. Aside from them, he wore only a narrow wrap of woven kelp, its green strands dark and slick, clinging close and unembarrassed. It did nothing to hide the shape of his manhood, and he seemed wholly indifferent to the fact.

His eyes were pale blue and almost human - clear, watchful, touched by depths difficult to measure.

He sat upon a throne grown from living coral, pink and branching, its high back rising in delicate fans while thick, knotted arms curved outward like reef formations shaped by centuries of patient waves. The structure looked fragile at first glance - until one noticed the density beneath its beauty, the quiet resilience of something that had withstood a thousand storms.

“Grind him beneath our heels,” Aurelion answered. “Shatter his Faith. Show him the power of the High Witan.”

“We founded this institution upon noninterference,” said Solenna, the Burning Crown.

Her deep brown skin gleamed beneath the shifting auroras that encircled the floating platform. White flame rose lazily from her head, casting stark light across her strong, amazonian frame. She sat straight-backed upon her glass throne, prismatic light scattering at her feet.

“This is not the first threat we have faced,” she continued. “Brand once made similar boasts, and we did not move to strike him down.”

“Brand had his uses,” Aurelion snapped. “Seth has outlived his.”

Solenna’s gaze hardened. “Then we will reflect before we act.” Silence settled over the Concordance, heavy as stormclouds. “We reconvene at the full moon,” she said. “Then we decide.”